Tokyo stocks seen lower on Wall St slide, firm yen

TOKYO, Sep 25 (Reuters) Japanese stocks are likely to move lower on Tuesday with financial shares such as Mizuho Financial Group Inc falling after credit worries hit Wall Street again overnight, while a stronger yen may weigh on exporters.

Japanese markets were closed on Monday for a national holiday.

Yutaka Miura, deputy manager of the equity information department at Shinko Securities, said the appointment of Yasuo Fukuda as leader of the ruling Liberal Democratic Party on Sunday seemed to be a neutral factor for the market.

One notable stock may be Toyota Motor Corp The Nikkei business daily said on Tuesday the Japanese automaker plans to launch a fuel-efficient ultracompact car in Europe around 2009, tapping growing demand for small cars meeting the region's tight emissions rules.

''Financial shares may be sold as there seems to be a global tendency to remove those stocks from portfolios despite individual differences. The IMF's warning that subprime problems will likely drag on and expand may also weigh on markets,'' Miura said.

Turmoil in global credit and money markets will likely continue as investors worry about the size of financial losses and where they might arise, the International Monetary Fund said on Monday.

''The yen is trading in the 114s against the dollar, and exporter stocks may have a hard time,'' Miura added.

Market participants said Tokyo's benchmark Nikkei average will likely move between 16,200 and 16,400 on Tuesday after finishing Friday down 0.6 percent at 16,312.61.

On Sunday, Fukuda was voted LDP president by a wide margin and is now the clear successor to Shinzo Abe as prime minister on Tuesday, when the Lower House will vote for a new premier.

Miura said investors are watching further developments such as Fukuda's new administration members and their policies.

In New York on Monday, the dollar traded around 114.75 down 0.6 percent.

U.S. stocks fell on Monday as financial shares weakened on news that Germany's largest bank may take a big hit from subprime mortgage investments. The Dow Jones industrial average finished down 0.44 percent at 13,759.06.

STOCKS TO WATCH -- Mitsubishi UFJ Financial Group, other banks MUFG, Japan's biggest bank, says it may need to mark some of its investment securities at ''a significantly lower price'' due to credit market deterioration from subprime mortgage defaults in the United States.

-- Toyota Tsusho Corp Toyota Tsusho, a trading company partly owned by Toyota Motor, said on Friday it expects Toyota's overseas output to reach 6.2-6.3 million units in 2011, revising up its previous estimate of 5.8 million units.

Junzo Shimizu, Toyota Tsusho's president and CEO, also told Reuters in an interview that his company's first-half profit would likely exceed the internal target helped by strong sales of cars and metals and the weak yen.

-- NEC Corp NEC said on Friday its ADRs would likely be delisted from the Nasdaq exchange as it could not file a report or restate its earnings results to standards required by the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission.

-- Mizuho Financial Mizuho, Japan's second-largest bank, said it would cancel 214,900 of its own shares, equal to 1.9 percent of its total outstanding stock.

-- Nisshin Oillio Group, Pietro Co Ltd Nisshin Oillio, Japan's largest cooking-oil maker, said on Friday it would raise its stake in food company Pietro Co to 20 percent and the two had agreed to a business alliance.

-- Yamada Denki Co, Best Denki Co Yamada Denki, Japan's top electronics retailer, plans to increase its stake in smaller rival Best Denki Co. to 20 percent, the Nikkei business daily reported on Saturday.

-- Advantest Corp Advantest, Japan's top maker of semiconductor testing equipment, will likely miss its annual profit forecast as makers of computer memory chips curb investment, the Nikkei business daily reported on Saturday.

Reuters KK VP0540